COTO DE CAZA, Thomas Quinn: The irony of the Judith Lewis letter was hard to miss [“Limbaugh's message on sex, women no fluke,” March 6]. She excoriated Rush Limbaugh not only for his Neanderthal views of women but for misrepresenting the issues. Lewis then misrepresents the issues herself.

Lewis summarized issues arising from the mandate on insurance coverage for contraceptives in the following way: “The mandated coverage simply ensures that insurance companies must provide medically approved contraception and that certain groups can't prohibit access to contraception because of their personal religious or moral beliefs.”

First, the opinions of Lewis and others seem to be founded upon some belief that we all have a fundamental right not only to insurance coverage, but to insurance coverage for contraceptives. No such right exists.

Second, Lewis and others try to make this an issue of contraception. It is not. No one denies Lewis or anyone else contraception. She can pay for it herself. Or, if she wants her employer-provided health insurance, she can work for a company that provides it. Most companies do provide it.

However, a church or an organization run by a church should not be required to provide services that violate its fundamental beliefs. The right of religious organizations to be free from government intrusion is at stake here, a right protected under the First Amendment, which says, among other things: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.”

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ORANGE, Donald Downs: Sandra Fluke has been victimized, as have many contemporary Americans, by being sold on the overused, often-maligned definition of the term “right.” True rights are few, narrow in scope and immune to perpetual contemporary re-definition.

Each legal right that a person possesses relates to a corresponding legal duty imposed on another. For example, if law student Sandra Fluke owns a home, she has the right to possess and enjoy it free from the interference of other citizens, who are under a corresponding duty not to interfere with Fluke's rights by trespassing or breaking into her home.

This is not what Fluke, President Barack Obama and Rep. Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., want, nor is it their self-serving definition of “right.” They want mandated coverage for all, no matter the reason, paid for by someone else even though coverage may impair the rights of other citizens.

Fluke, exercised her free will of choice and enrolled in Georgetown, a Catholic university. Fluke pays no attention to the true rights of other people and religious groups. She demands that other freely associated citizens, who may have a religious reason not to pay for someone's contraception, pay for it.

Perhaps Fluke would have a different view if her contraceptive rights were impaired by allowing those who pay for the contraception to review and approve with whom she uses the contraception.

A libertarian weighs in

MISSION VIEJO, Keith Eckman: Judith Lewis' comments reveal that she doesn't know the difference between liberal beliefs and libertarian beliefs on the contraception issue. Libertarians, believe that no one should be forced to sacrifice their individual values for other people's values. Lewis believes the government should mandate insurance coverage of medically approved contraception and abortion. In other words, the Jesuit Catholic College should be forced to change its beliefs to liberal beliefs on contraception and abortion.

Moreover, libertarians believe in individual liberty to provide for themselves. Lewis believes contraception benefits should be provided to Sandra Fluke free of charge, rather than letting Fluke exercise her personal freedom to provide them for herself.

Furthermore, the issue of insurance provided for contraception distracts the discussion away from the real issue of the attack on the First Amendment that the liberal view of “separation of church and state” so frequently throws out.

In summary, libertarians hold that all individuals have the right to exercise sole dominion over their own lives, and have the right to live in whatever manner they choose, so long as they do not forcibly interfere with the equal right of others to live in whatever manner they choose.

No coercion in choice

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